Learn from the Masters (of Web Design)

Written by Stefene Russell

If you've ever been to Louvre, you know it's chock full of art students, who spend hours in museum with their sketchpads, copying works of Masters. Poets do it too; that's why English majors spend hours doing "close readings" of Shakespeare before they begin to write their own stuff.

The "Learn from Masters" philosophy is what's behind Project Cool's "Sightings" section, and I think it's a sound one. Every day, one of their Dev-X editors chooses a site with outstanding design to inspire you to new web-mastering heights. If you really want to improve your web-building skills quickly, sign up to receive their daily "Sightings" newsletter, and spend ten minutes a day studying a great website. If you hate having your mailbox stuffed to capacity, you can also just browse their archives for ideas.

Here are some recent examples:

KG Worldwide http://www.kgworldwide.com/index1.htm Says Sightings, "Here's an example of how well a simple design can work. This site presents a clear navigation path for user, but still maintains a professional designer's flair. Go to "The History" page to see a cool horizontal scroll interface."

Ten Tips for Building an Ecom Web Site

Written by June Campbell

You've implemented online sales, now how to convince customer to buy? Here are nine tips for building a site that encourages rather than discourages online shopping.

10.Design for your target market. Find out who your potential customers are and why they come to your site. Use surveys, focus groups or usability studies to discover their preferences, patterns and requirements.

9. Identify your goals for site and introduce content accordingly. One Internet marketer tells story of erroneously marketing an automotive book as an aid to car repair when real market for his publication was new car buyers.

6. Provide good navigational structure, including search capabilities for larger sites. Allow your viewers to navigate easily no matter where they entered your site. Free your sales area of links to other Internet sites. Why encourage customers to leave when you've worked so hard to attract them?